


We Depend on You

by Krowshi



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Also Red Lion (Voltron) is a mom, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gender-Neutral Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, Headcanon, Keith/Lance (Voltron) Angst, Lance (Voltron) is a Mess, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-25
Updated: 2017-01-25
Packaged: 2018-09-19 21:22:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9460877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Krowshi/pseuds/Krowshi
Summary: In which Keith loses his temper and says things he doesn't mean. Lance takes it to heart and leaves everything behind only to be later found by something he wasn't expecting.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so sorry about this in advance. I wrote a majority of it during class and then the rest of it late at night so it might be. Eh.  
> But this is a break in me writing my normal Oisuga so pls take my offering.  
> Coughs and there might be a few things I had to ignore in order to make this idea work. Ngl
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoy reading! Leave comments and kudos if you would like! I'd appreciate it very much!

_“Lance! Just shut your stupid mouth for once in your life, no one wants to even hear it, it’s just worthless!”_

At that point, nothing could stop him from falling further into his doubts and breaking through the ice, suffocating in the ice cold water and turning him blue with hypothermia and lack of oxygen. Ironic that the element his lion thrived in was what was being compared to his mental state. Nothing was special about him and there certainly wasn’t anything worth staying in the castle for. It’s worthless, _he’s worthless._

Lance threw what little items he had into his bag that had managed to come with him after being shot into space with Blue and the others on that one fateful day and zipped it up and threw it over his shoulder. Glancing over at his paladin armor, Lance considered in taking it to make sure he survived wherever he may go, but then again, maybe he can find something else on the ship. He didn’t want to be tracked, he didn’t want there to be anyway for him to be followed.

 _Silence fell over them for a tick. The tick seemed to last forever as they stared at each other and Keith slowly began to realize what he had said. “A-ah - I’m sor-”  
“No,” Lance cut him off, face expressionless and body language hard to read. “I get it. I heard you loud and clear.”_

After searching for some sort of space suit within the wide expanse that was the castle, he came upon a closet in a dark corridor that held a few rows of them. He searched until he found one that would fit him and slipped it on, his next destination being the pod hanger where he would throw his bag into the passenger seat of one of the pods and plant himself into the driver’s seat of said pod. After so long of flying blue around space, Lance didn’t even second guess himself when he started up the pod and flew it out of the ship, no room for reconsiderations to be made as he traveled farther into the lonely expanse of the galaxy.

 _“Lance, please, listen to me!” The cry was ignored, brushed off as the brunette turned with a cold shoulder and walked away, ignoring his the red paladin’s pleas and certainly not turning back around to catch the wounded look on other male’s face that would surely send him crumbling back._  
______________

“A pod left the ship last night!”

Allura was stationed at her control panel, a red symbol blinking back at her and reflecting off her face as she stared wide eyed, fingers frozen and hovering over it in shock. “Who, though? Paladins, who is missing!” Allura yelled frantically, turning to the group that gathered in the main room. Coran stood next to her, so he was certainly out of the question and she had to summon everyone else to do a headcount.

“Shiro… Pidge… Keith… Hunk… Wait, there is only four of you, where is Lance?” The Altean questioned, eyes darting between them and even to the door that she would expect him to come through eventually.

“Maybe he’s taking his time getting over here? You know how he can be,” Hunk noted with a shrug. “We can just wait a few, I’m sure he’ll be here soon.” The others silently agreed, however Keith remained still, eyes trained to the ground, looking fearful. The silence in the room carried on for a while, slowly but surely becoming suffocating and and uncomfortable.

“I’ll go get him!!” Keith blurted out quickly before turning on his heel and storming through the door back to the castle hallways. The group let their eyes travel after him and then they all looked to each other in concern. Something wasn’t right.

Arriving at the door to the blue paladin’s room, the black haired male raised a fist to it and banged loudly. “Come on, Lance! No more fooling around, we’re all waiting for you!”

Silence.

“This isn’t funny, man! If you think this is some type of joke, I’m gonna come in and hand it to you!” Keith tried again, gritting his teeth as his nerves rose through the roof.

_More silence._

“Alright, Lance! You asked for it, I’m coming in!” Keith willed the door open and stomped his way into the middle of it before fear froze his bones solid.

_He wasn’t there._

A wail echoed through the corridors, drawing everyone from the main room to grow alert and dash to the source. When they arrived, Shiro the first to step into the doorway, they all stared at the shaking Keith on the ground, eyes blasted open with a large range of emotions and tears streaming down his cheeks like rivers. Hands clutched his hair almost painfully as he failed to notice the presence of others in the room.

“Keith! - Allura, please go see if you can track Lance down, maybe his armor will -”

“His armor is here, Shiro,” Pidge piped up, a slightly shaky finger pointing over at the distinct marker of the blue paladin. Shiro looked at it in disbelief, suddenly at a loss in what to do. He slowly turned to look at the others behind him, eyes looking for answers. Allura looked on sadly, hands clutched close to herself.

“It doesn’t help that there was no indication of the blue lion leaving either. He was the one who took the pod and left everything else behind - but why?” Allura asked, eyes searching. Surely the blue lion might have gone after him, after all, the two did have quite the bond.

“Because I’m stupid,” Keith finally said, voice shaky and broken. Eyes slowly drew to him in question, prodding him further to go on. “Because I was stupid and told him that he should stop talking! That it was worthless! But I didn’t mean it! I just want him back, I care about him more than he ever could know but now he’ll never know!!” Keith spat, curling more into himself as he yelled.

“Keith -” Shiro started, but it was Coran’s voice over the speakers that stopped him.

“Uh, guys. The red lion is on the move, is Keith still there?” Coran asked. “Also, it appears the blue lion is also awake, but she isn’t moving.”

“What is happening…” Hunk spoke out, his voice drawing out as he slumped forward. Despite everything though, Keith seemed to have stopped shaking. Instead, he slowly sat up, eyes wide and some sparks of something unidentifiable passed through them.

A gentle purr rang in the back of his head, quiet like a mother’s hum, letting him know that everything will be alright and that she will be back soon. Red has Blue on her side to help her out.

“She’s going to get him…” Keith said. “Blue knows where he is… But Red insists to get him…”  
_______________

Lance sighed as he drifted through space, mind blank of thoughts as he floated along. This was for the best. He told himself no matter the constant nagging he felt in his mind. Even the smallest semblance of Blue’s voice tried to reach out to him, but he pushed it away, willing her not to come after him. 

“Yes… I’ll be out here… By myself… Bothering no one,” Lance mumbled to himself, hands gripping more on the steering wheel as his eyes hardened. His knuckles turned white the more he tightened his grip and he suddenly felt a wave of emotions creep over him. Gritting his teeth, Lance stopped the pod from moving and leaned forward, his head resting against the dashboard as he shook violently, tears rushing out quickly. 

“Why can't you see I can't go back, you're only making things harder on yourself,” Lance sobbed out, inhaling deeply past his tears. A flash of Keith flooded his head space and suddenly he was breaking even more. “No! He couldn't ever love you back! It's obvious that he doesn't!” He yelled out. 

That's when a dull growl sounded in the background. 

“Great, now you're hearing things, Lance,” he muttered, lifting his head and rubbing at his eyes. A flash of red broke through his vision and with a bit of processing, Lance finally looked straight on with blinking eyes. “Wait, what.”

The red lion floated in front of him, it's presence big and imposing and very much there. 

“God dammit, how did you… Keith, if you're in there, go away!” He said, making a shooing motion with his hands. Yet, the lion didn't dare budge. With a groan, Lance went to turn the pod back on and put his hands back on the controls. “Alright, I'm going then, don't follow me. I already know how you feel so no need to yell at me more.”

But what he didn't expect was for the red lion to lunge forward and bite into the ship. Lance shrieked and jumped back in his pod, staring wide eyed as the red lion pried the hatch open, thanking whatever God there was that he had protection against the lack of oxygen. The red lion looked at Lance a while, waiting for him to move towards her and when he didn't, she drew forward and grabbed him by the collar of his suit. 

“Woah, woah, woah! Hey buddy, be careful!” he shouted, quickly grabbing his bag before he could get lifted up any further, ultimately being tossed up like a toy before Lance was engulfed by the red lion. Once inside the cockpit, the brunette groaned out in not only frustration but slight pain as he laid draped over his bag on the floor. 

Upon looking up from his pile on the ground, he noticed that there was no pilot - no Keith - with him in the lion to be seen. “What…” He mumbled, looking blankly at the vacant seat in front of him. There was a low rumble in response that came from the red lion, vibrating the floor underneath him before he felt the lion start to move. “Red, you know I'm not your Paladin, right?”

Another rumble came in response, but he couldn't quite tell what the grumbling meant like he could tell with Blue. A sigh drew out of him for many ticks as he picked himself up from the ground and went to sit in the piloting chair. Lance stared out the windows, watching the stars pass by as Red flew him back to - what he assumed - was the space castle. He couldn’t understand. Out of all the lions, he would think Blue would come after him, not Red, the lion that belonged to Keith of all people.

Suddenly, a purr invaded his mind, louder and clearer than he had heard it when he was traveling the opposite direction, but this time he understood it. _You’ll find out soon enough._ Was what was deciphered from that. The vagueness of it all stressed him out more and he leaned his head back, combing a hand through his brown locks with mild irritation on his face. 

Once the castle ship was within viewing distance, Lance felt the anxiety begin to boil at the pit of his stomach like a fire slowly beginning to light. The fire was burning down his metaphorical house down by the time the lion reached the deck and floated a bit until landing next to Blue and settling in before releasing him. There waiting for him was none other than the crew he had left behind… Save for Keith.

_Of course he wouldn’t be here,[/I] Lance thought to himself. [i]Even his lion seemed to care more than him._

“Lance! You had us all worried! What in the quiznack were you thinking going off like that!” Allura was the first to yell out. While usually his first impulse would be to feel flattered by the princess’s worry, at this moment in time, feeling drained and broken, Lance had no will to acknowledge it with any flirting.

“I don’t see the problem,” Lance said instead, surprising everyone with his lack of… Well, himself. 

“Lance…” Shiro mumbled out, his gaze turning soft and sad. “You could have died, we could have never ever seen you ever again. Without Red and her bond with Keith -”

“I don’t want to hear about Keith, alright!?” Lance bit out, his teeth grinding together as he stomped a foot down and gave an angry face. This threw everyone off slightly, but with an exchange of knowing glances and a Pidge coming forward, they patted Lance on the back with a secretive smile.

“Alright, alright. We’ll leave you alone. Why don’t you go rest in your room then?” Pidge said, their face remaining to hold a sense of knowing and this brought a confused expression onto the tan male’s face. 

“Al… right?” Lance said before slinging his bag over his shoulder and walking off. He left the others with hopeful expressions painting their faces.  
_______________

He sighed, that seems to be something he has done a lot of today and he will admit, after everything that has happened, he really did need some rest. Opening the door to his room, Lance walked in, not necessarily paying attention to his surroundings as he set his bag down, he didn’t even turn the lights on.

Walking up to his bedside, he almost flopped forward into the bed until he realized that the bed looked lumpier than usual. Cautiously, bringing his bayard out to the side, Lance quickly lifted up the sheet on the bed to reveal a head of black hair and a curled up ball of Keith.

“What the fuck,” Lance said loudly, voice sounding more blunt than questioning. This caused the body in the bed to slowly start to move and for dark blue eyes to slowly blink open and look up at the intruder in the room.

Except it wasn’t an intruder and Keith shot up quickly, eyes wide with surprise and also looking like they held unshed tears. With a long drawn out staring contest accompanied by silence, a tear fell from keith’s eye. And another. And another. And one more. 

Letting himself slump forward, Keith grabbed onto Lance and pulled him close against his will, quietly sobbing into his shoulder and squeezing him like he would disappear from him at any moment. Lance wasn’t quick to reciprocate the action, too confused by everything to do so, but he eventually rested his hands on the other’s back.

“Keith, what is going on…” Lance muttered out quietly, his voice barely even loud enough for him to hear. In response, the other male dug his face in deeper into the blue paladin’s shoulder and shook violently.

“You scared me, Lance… I thought you were gone… I thought I would never see you again… I thought you abandoned me… Us, forever…” The red paladin eventually got out, his voice cracking in spots and sounding weak and unused. “Don’t ever do that again… Never, ever… No matter what I say…”

Lance stared down at the head of black hair for a long while, his mind processing the other’s words before he reluctantly pulled Keith away by the shoulders so that they could look eye to eye. Keith looked like a wreck, hair disheveled, eyes rimmed pink from many crying sessions, clothing rumpled…

“Keith, what are you saying? I thought…” he trailed off, looking away and letting Keith fill in the rest on his own. Of all the things he had said earlier, of the words that sent Lance into shut down.

“I love you, Lance. That’s what I’m saying.”

The brunette’s head whipped up at break neck speed at that remark, his eyes blown wide in shock and his face slowly but surely growing red at the confession. “I-I…” He stuttered, his words lost to the new wave of emotions that hit him like a tsunami. He then connected the distress that Keith must have felt to the red lion’s retrieval of him and suddenly everything lined up…

“Red got me because I was the reason why you were hurting.”

“Yes.”

“And Blue let her because she knew it would help things out…”

“Yes…”

“I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I love you, too, stupid Keith,” Lance said before bringing the shorter paladin in for a tight hug, burying his face into black tufts of hair. “I love you and your stupid mullet,” he continued, drawing out a shaky laugh from the boy within his arms. He squeezed tightly and laid them both down on the bed. “I promise you this, I won’t ever go anywhere away from you on purpose again. I’ll be right here. As your teammate… and your boyfriend,” Lance said, giving his customary wiggle of his eyebrow. The smile that pulled at the corners of Keith’s mouth after that drew the tan boy in and stole his breath away all at once.

“Good, that’s all I’ve ever wanted to hear,” Keith said, leaning forward and pressing a kiss to Lance’s mouth, the gesture eagerly returned quickly after. No more words needed to be exchanged, no more silent apologies needed to be given, it was just them and their shared fondness. It was just them and their love.


End file.
